Optical networks and the like (e.g., Dense Wave Division Multiplexing (DWDM), Synchronous Optical Network (SONET), Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH), Optical Transport Network (OTN), Ethernet, and the like) at various layers are deploying control plane systems and methods. Control planes provide an automatic allocation of network resources in an end-to-end manner. Exemplary control planes may include Automatically Switched Optical Network (ASON) as defined in ITU-T G.8080/Y.1304, Architecture for the automatically switched optical network (ASON) (February 2005), the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference; Generalized Multi-Protocol Label Switching (GMPLS) Architecture as defined in IETF Request for Comments (RFC): 3945 (October 2004) and the like, the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference; Optical Signaling and Routing Protocol (OSRP) from Ciena Corporation which is an optical signaling and routing protocol similar to Private Network-to-Network Interface (PNNI) and Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS); or any other type control plane for controlling network elements at multiple layers, and establishing connections among nodes. Control planes are configured to establish end-to-end signaled connections such as Subnetwork Connections (SNCs) in ASON or OSRP and Label Switched Paths (LSPs) in GMPLS and MPLS. Note, as described herein, SNCs and LSPs can generally be referred to as services in the control plane. Also, note the aforementioned control planes are circuit-based control planes, e.g., operating at Layer 1 (Time Division Multiplexing (TDM)) and/or Layer 0 (wavelengths). Control planes use the available paths to route the services and program the underlying hardware accordingly.
In addition to control planes which are distributed, a centralized method of control exists with Software Defined Networking (SDN) which utilizes a centralized controller. SDN is an emerging framework which includes a centralized control plane decoupled from the data plane. SDN provides the management of network services through abstraction of lower-level functionality. This is done by decoupling the system that makes decisions about where traffic is sent (the control plane) from the underlying systems that forward traffic to the selected destination (the data plane). Examples of SDN include OpenFlow (www.opennetworking.org), General Switch Management Protocol (GSMP) defined in RFC 3294 (June 2002), and Forwarding and Control Element Separation (ForCES) defined in RFC 5810 (March 2010), the contents of all are incorporated by reference herein. Note, distributed control planes can be used in conjunction with centralized controllers in a hybrid deployment.
Advantageously, control plane and/or SDN management provide a rich set of Operations, Administration, Maintenance, and Provisioning (OAM&P) features for underlying services in the network. One particular type of service may include a multi-drop, unidirectional service. Note, typically most network services are bi-directional between a source node and a destination node. A unidirectional service only transmits from the source node to the destination node. A multi-drop unidirectional service transmits from the source node to the destination node with one or more intermediate drops of the service at intermediate nodes. An example of a multi-drop, unidirectional service may include a video broadcast. Conventionally, multi-drop, unidirectional services are manually supported in optical networks with manual Flexible Cross Connects (FCCs) provisioned at the intermediate nodes. Disadvantageously, the manual support for these services does not allow the use of the rich set of management features in control planes and/or SDN such as route calculation, mesh restoration, single point and click configuration, and the like.